| The original, most natural and finest method, is the method used to make Champagne.
In the mid 17th Century, a French monk, Dom Perignon, drew together years of local knowledge to produce the first true sparkling Champagne.
It had been known for some time that, if you put a second dose of yeast and sugar into your wine, it would ferment again giving off CO2 gas. Dom Perignon found that, if he used strong bottles made in England, which didnít explode with the pressure, and stoppered them with cork, rather than wooden pegs that let the gas out, he could trap the bubbles in the bottle.
He was also the first to blend the base wines from different vineyards and different years to get a consistent flavour time after time.
Today the basic methods used to make these great wines has hardly changed. However the wines of Champagne, produced in North East France, are protected by law.
It is illegal to call any other sparkling wine ëChampagneí or even describe it as being made by the ëChampagne Methodí
However, because many countries make wine that has a second fermentation in the bottle, they label it in different ways. the most usual are Method Traditionelle or in Australia often labelled simply as ëSecond fermentation in the bottleî Cava from Spain is also made by this method although the grapes used are different,. |
